The game of golf is primarily accuracy based. Referring now to FIG. 1, ultimately the golfer 100 wants to strike a ball 102 and have it land at a target landing point 104, which may be the pin 106. For ease of discussion, the pin 106 is considered herein as the target landing point, although it is to be understood that this need not be the case.
Ideally (in optimal weather conditions) the golfer wants to strike the ball along an imaginary straight line drawn from the ball 102 to the target landing point 104, referred to herein as the “correct true heading”. When the golfer strikes the ball squarely along that line with a stroke exactly coincident to that line at time of impact, the trajectory towards target is optimized for that path in still weather conditions.
A methodology for aligning the body with the ball is often referred to as the “railroad tracks”. The golfer approximates or judges the correct true heading, which acts as one rail of the railroad tracks. The golfer then aligns the forward ends of his feet in parallel with the selected heading, which acts as the other rail of the railroad tracks. The hands are then placed in optimal position on the club, with the hand facing the ball preferably perpendicular to the correct true heading. FIG. 2 shows the correct orientation of the golfer relative to a particular shot. If correctly aligned, the strike path of the ball 102 to the target landing point 104 is optimized for that path.
Referring now to FIGS. 3 and 4, a drawback of the above methodology is that any misalignment will cause the ball strike path to deviate from the target landing point 104. Misalignment may come from, inter alia, a poor judgment/approximation of the correct true heading, misalignment of the golfer's feet relative to parallel with the correct true heading, misalignment of the golfer's hand relative to the perpendicular to the correct true heading, etc. At 100 yards between the ball 102 and the target landing point 104, one (1) degree of misalignment translates to over five feet of lateral deviation from the intended landing point.